Monthly Archives: May 2005

Following up on our post from Sunday, Rush Limbaugh cited our red and blue state map of France today. I’m not sure, though, that we have gotten to the bottom of what these divisions mean in the context of French politics. At first I thought the pattern was very similar to our own red/blue divide, at least in cultural terms, but Michael Barone interpreted it in an email to us »

We commented here on the end of Daniel Okrent’s tenure as Public Editor of the New York Times, and the parting shots he took at Paul Krugman, Maureen Dowd and William Safire. Krugman is not one to take criticism lying down (or any other way), so he replied to Okrent, which triggered a dialogue that you can read here. Krugman’s efforts to defend himself against the charge of slicing and »

David Rivkin and Lee Casey show how dishonest Amnesty International’s 2005 Report on worldwide human rights is, at least when it comes to assessing the U.S. “First and foremost,” Rivkin and Casey state, “Amnesty »

This afternoon I participated in CNN’s annual World Report International Conference for its overseas affiliates. I was part of a panel on blogging that included Harry McDougald, the famous “Buckhead” of 60 Minutes fame, Rebecca McKinnon, John Aravosis, Chris Nolan, Christopher Allbright, who self-financed a trip to Iraq as a free-lance journalist through a blog, Howard Kaushansky of Umbria Software, and someone I’m forgetting. Our moderator was Michael Holmes, an »

In the July 1974 issue of Commentary magazine, before Richard Nixon resigned from office, Edward Jay Epstein asked in a memorable essay: “Did the press uncover Watergate?” Epstein asked more specifically “who was ‘Deep Throat’ and what was his motivation for leaking information to Woodward and Bernstein?” He inferred that Deep Throat was likely a high-ranking officer of the FBI. (My vague recollection is that he actually named Mark Felt, »

I hope to meet some of our New York Power Line readers tomorrow, June 1, when I appear at the Overseas Press Club of America for a discussion of whether blogs are hurting or helping the American public remain informed about international news. The other participants will be Joe Trippi, Mike Moran, Rebecca MacKinnon, and Marshall Loeb. Sreenath Sreenivasan of Columbia University’s School of Journalism will moderate. The program will »

This Associated Press report on President Bush’s news conference earlier today quotes the President on various issues, including the Amnesty International report. What struck me, though, was this sentence at the end of the article: Though he did not mention tax cuts in his opening argument, Bush said he still wants Congress to make his first-term cuts permanent. He also pledged not to give up on Social Security reform, despite »

Thomas Friedman exhorts the government to “shut down” Gitmo. Friedman’s argument is that the world is so outraged by what is happening at Gitmo (or what reportedly is happening — Friedman doesn’t seem to worry about the distinction), that for purely public relations purposes, we must release the Gitmo detainees. This is pretty na »

As always, poll results depend a lot on how you ask the question. The latest Zogby poll finds that 52% of Americans supported Social Security reform, including private accounts, when they were told that private accounts could generate a higher rate of return than Social Security. (I’ve never liked talking about Social Security “rates of return,” since the fact is that there isn’t any investment, just payment of taxes.) Here »

I’m at CNN’s World Report International Conference (or something like that) in Atlanta. It’s lunch time, and my panel, on blogging, will begin at 2:15. Just before lunch Wolf Blitzer did an interview with President Musharraf of Pakistan; Musharraf also took questions from the audience. I’ve always been impressed by Musharraf, but have never seen him for more than a few minutes at a time. He’s very, very good. He »

David Horowitz’s FrontPage column today follows up on his book Unholy Alliance: Radical Islam and the American Left. The column features the execrable George Galloway and the legal assault on our terrorist incarceration center at Guantanamo: “Vindication: There is an unholy alliance.” Before Horowitz wrote the book on the subject, I tried to describe the phenomenon in a FrontPage column based on my attendance at the National Lawyers Guild national »

Michael Phillips is the son of Minneapolis attorney Felix Phillips, the brother of novelist Arthur Phillips, and is himself an excellent reporter for the Wall Street Journal. Last spring the Journal published Phillips’s riveting account of the service in Iraq of Marine Cpl. Jason Dunham: “In combat, Marines put theory to test, comrades believe.” At I Love Jet Noise, Phillips’s story was noted in “No words.” Phillips has expanded his »

Miss Canada, Natalie Glebova, won the Miss Universe contest tonight. I haven’t checked for a few days, but last I knew, she was the betting favorite. Here she is, during the swimsuit competition: Miss Canada was the only non-Latin American finalist; the others were Miss Miss Dominican Republic, Miss Mexico, Miss Puerto Rico and Miss Venezuela. So it was a New World sweep. I wasn’t able to live-blog the competition »

Both Mrs. Trunk and Little Trunk have directed me to Senator Byrd’s reference to one of Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales” as featured on Laura Ingraham’s radio show last week. Tracking down the reference on the Internet, it appears that Byrd invoked the “Pardoner’s Tale” (Lord, save me) during his announcement of the Missouri Compromise on the filibuster reached by the Gang of 14. On his Web site, Byrd refers to the »

Today President Bush laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery. The White House has posted his remarks here. He said: At our National Cemetery, we’re reminded why America has always been a reluctant warrior. This year we celebrate the 60th anniversary of the end of World War II, a victory for which more than 400,000 Americans gave their lives. Their courage crossed two »

Our friend Dafydd ab Hugh is guest-blogging over at Patterico’s Pontifications. One of his early posts analogizes Harry Reid’s exhorting fellow Democrats to resume the filibuster before the ink on the “moderates'” “agreement” is dry to a Brady Bunch episode in which Greg has been grounded…well, you’d better just read it. Dafydd is working on his own web site which, he assures us, is coming soon. It sounds like it »

Regarding John’s post on “red state/blue state France” immediately below, Michael Barone writes: I was just looking at your red-and-blue map of the French vote. The oui areas–Brittany, Alsace, the central city of Paris and the department including Neuilly just to the west–have this in common: they are the areas most supportive of the party of the right. It seems that Chirac’s party’s people voted his way more than others. »